Beyond The Gate
Chapter 1
To The Gate

Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail or the song.

I Don't Need A Second Chance
I Need A Friend
Someone Who's Gonna Stand By Me
Right There Till The End

-3LAU feat. Bright Lights "How You Love Me"

Roars of dragons tore the sky apart, the vibrations echoing amongst the buildings that remained standing. The structures quivered as the sound shuddered around their corners, distorting the pitch and length into something far more terrifying than the original. Bright flickering flames scorched the edifices of the city, their serpentine path unaffected by the immutable stone.; all melted and burned in the face of dragon flames.

The sanguine moon stained the world red, and blotted out the stars' more cheery light. Despite the early hour, nothing remained hidden under the crimson gaze. Every battle scar outlined in sharp relief, the wounds of war yet bled scarlet over the earth.

A young, once pretty blonde woman lurked behind one of the few standing corners of a building she could no longer identify the function of. Her clothes were stained with soot – torn and tattered and barely covering what they were meant to (not that they hadn't been rather revealing in the first place). Her lungs were clogged with smog, any oxygen pulled into them superheated to the point where she thought she might spout fire like the beasts that battled around her. Ash fell from her hair with every intake of breath only for more to drift from above to alight upon and then embed within it.

Oddly, what concerned her most about her situation was the fact that the dirt and blood caked all over her exposed skin had started to itch something fierce.

Never mind the monstrous children of Mother Glare that stalked nearby – a number exponentially growing by minute. There was nothing she could really do to fight them anyway, being out of magic and physical willpower. What she needed was a bath. Preferably before she scratched herself out of what little skin she still possessed that was not yet marred by burns, scrapes, and sores. She also needed to locate a toilet. Natural bodily functions did not seem to care about whether or not one was trying to save the world. She bit her lip and suppressed a groan of frustration. She'd be damned if she allowed herself to be killed with her pants literally down (not that she was wearing pants, per se, but it was more the sentiment of the thing).

Honestly, the only spot of luck she seemed to be having was that the fanged things that leapt amongst the rubble appeared to be attracted to magic. Something she didn't possess much of right now.

She glanced up as a gargantuan shadow passed overhead.

'Mother Glare,' she observed. And, upon the dragon's back, she could faintly make out the true enemy. An individual worse than the seven dragons he had called forth from the gate combined. He was locked in combat with her best friend, for the second time (or was it the third? Fourth? She didn't know anymore).

Gulping back greasy, hot ash laced with air, she heaved herself forward again. "Natsu," she half-sobbed (if only there was moisture left for real tears). Jaw set, her gaze and gait became more determined. She would reach the gate. She had to. Before the sun rose, and the moon returned to its previous state. Before the lunar eclipse ended. Before they lost their opportunity to send the dragons back to where they came from.

Natsu could handle Future Rogue. She had complete faith in her best friend. He'd never failed her, their team, their guild, or anyone, really, when it had mattered most. This qualified as one of those situations, she felt. In fact, it was the situation as far as she was concerned. There was no question that Natsu would come through in the end; her part, however, wasn't as certain.

Stumbling over one of the many boulders that littered her path, she sprawled out on the other side. It took her a moment or three to compose herself. Exhaustion was prompting her to rest, if only for a short while. Gritting her teeth and biting back dirt, she raised her head up.

Suddenly, she felt new energy surge through her veins as she glimpsed her destination. The Eclipse Gate! She could see it! It wasn't much further now.

She was almost there.

Then the world exploded around her.

So, Just Lend Me Your Hand
And I'll Give You Someone To Hold Onto

-3LAU feat. Bright Lights "How You Love Me"

When the debris had settled, and the dust cloud lifted somewhat, the blonde was faced with several tons of scaly dragon between her and her destination. She recognized the fallen beast as Mother Glare.

This was just a little too much for her to handle right now.

"Really, Natsu?! You couldn't have crash landed the dragon anywhere other than right on top of me?!" she snapped, irritation providing her the extra boost she needed to stand up again.

A salmon-haired youth threw an unresponsive, large, clawed limb off of his body. Now free of the pinning weight of the monster, he rose to his feet and looked for his friend. "Sorry, Lucy!" he quickly apologized. He even sounded sincere. "I'll aim better next time!"

"You were trying to aim?! How, exactly?!" Lucy growled. "More importantly, what do you mean by 'aim better' in the first place? Were you trying to hit me? What if I hadn't been able to dodge in time?! Don't be so reckless!"

"Maybe if you lost some weight, you might be able to dodge better! Cut down on wind resistance!" the Fire Dragon Slayer suggested helpfully.

Lucy's eye twitched at the insult. The boy was just asking for a swift kick to the head (it wasn't as if he could possibly lose any more brain cells to begin with, and it would make her feel a lot better. His head was so dense he probably wouldn't even register that he'd been hit, anyway).

Natsu cupped his hands to his mouth. "Lucy!" he yelled. "Duck!"

Without hesitation, Lucy hit the deck as only a member of Fairy Tail could. A scorching heat passed overhead, where she'd been standing a moment earlier – close enough to singe a few errant strands of her blonde locks. Jagged stones dug into her stomach, but she held perfectly still until the temperature above her was survivable. Waves of heat rolled against her tender skin, settling in the already present burns and reigniting the pain with new vigor. But burns and pain were nothing new to Lucy – her best friend was a pyromaniac who possessed very little self-control after all.

Groaning, she pulled herself up again. Was it just her, or was falling on her face becoming a common occurrence?

She glanced over her shoulder to see what projectile she'd dodged this time, only to find a mass of pure, living flame attempting to extricate itself from the side of a building across the courtyard. Her eyes widened as she realized that it was one of the other dragons.

The creature swiveled it's flame-clad, skeletal head until it appeared to be looking at her. Then, to her astonishment, it laughed at its predicament. "I appear to be stuck, Son of Igneel!"

What was there to be stuck to? The dragon had no mass. It was a burning skeleton!

A pink-topped head tilted to the side as its owner regarded the fire dragon. "You do seem a bit on the heavy side, Uncle. Do you need me to eat your flames again? That'll help you lose weight! Too bad that won't work for Lucy, though."

This time, she gave in to temptation and threw a rock at the Dragon Slayer's face.

"Ow! What was that for, Lucy?!" He was holding his nose to stem the bloodflow caused by the rock.

"I am not fat!" she screamed. The boy shrugged, as if it were still open for debate.

"Please don't eat my flames!" the dragon interjected when Natsu took a menacing step in its direction. Upon seeing that the Dragon Slayer had no intention of listening to it, it struggled mightily against the collapsing steel beams of the ruined structure that trapped its skeletal form. Finally freeing itself, it turned to Lucy, who yelped at the attention.

"Nice dodge earlier," it complimented her.

She smiled nervously at it, not sure what exactly was going on anymore. "Thanks," she replied. 'Why is the dragon nicer and more polite than my best friend?' Swallowing, she asked, "So, I don't mean to be rude, but… are you on our side, now?"

"Yup!" Natsu answered for the dragon, giving her a thumbs up and his trademark grin. "We're friends now!"

The dragon repeated the gesture.

Lucy felt sweat slide down the back of her neck. 'Only Natsu. Why does this not actually surprise me?' Then she giggled somewhat hysterically at the odd situation, because she didn't know what else to do, really. Ingrained etiquette lessons took control as she introduced herself, "It's nice to meet you, and I'm glad you're an ally. My name is Lucy."

"I am Atlas Flame," the dragon roared proudly.

Movement beyond Mother Glare's unconscious body caught Lucy's attention. "Natsu! Look out!" she warned, just as a magical attack of jet and moonstone energy erupted towards her friend.

Her warning came in the nick of time, as Natsu dove out of the way. "That was a cheap shot!" he complained to his adversary.

Snarling, Future Rogue stood. His face was contorted into a mask of sheer rage. At some point during the fighting he'd lost whatever was tying his two-toned hair back – probably at the same time he'd acquired the several scorch marks his clothing was sporting (courtesy of Natsu). "How?!" he growled. "How did you break my dragon-controlling spell?!"

"Because we became friends," Natsu explained as if he were talking to a particularly dim toddler.

The rival Slayer and would-be-king's face twisted even more. His pale, gaping scar that bridged his nose stretched further across his face. Leaping over the inert dragon with an inarticulate, animalistic scream he attacked Natsu.

Clambering over debris, Lucy returned to her trek while Natsu returned to his own battle. She had to reach the gate while Future Rogue was distracted. She choked back tears of frustration and pain as, unbidden, the image of Future Lucy's sacrifice not a few hours ago surfaced in the forefront of her mind. Edging her way around Mother Glare, she hurried her pace as the dragon groaned and stirred, returning to consciousness once more.

Atlas Flame took the opportunity to leap over her and pounce on the recovering dragon. Both Mother Glare and Lucy yelped at the unexpected action.

A voice far behind her caused her to turn slightly to view the speaker. A white-blond, spiky haired Dragon Slayer was shading his eyes some distance away, watching Natsu's battle. "Rogue! Look! It really is you he's fighting! Nice hair choice and tattoo, by the way. Is that all the rage in seven years?"

Lucy quickly spun away before Sting's companion came into view. She knew he was on their side but… she also couldn't get the image of his future self murdering her future self out of her mind. Shaking herself, she fixed her gaze once more on her goal.

"That's not me!" The Shadow Dragon Slayer's normally monotonic voice was strained with anger and pain. "That's not my future!"

The rest of the conversation was lost as the two dragons the pair had been fighting crashed through the rubble to reach them.

'Why are all the dragons suddenly converging here?!' Lucy internally yelled at the unfairness of it all. Her muscles in her legs twitched. 'No,' she thought. 'Just a little further.' Unheedful of her wish, her lower limbs finally buckled and gave out as her temporary adrenaline rush faded. The blonde woman's vision swam with darkness and bright sunbursts.

An arm encircled her shoulders, and placed Lucy's around theirs'. Then the unknown ally lifted her back to her feet. Lucy tried to open her eyes to see her helper, but she couldn't make anything out.

"Blondie," a woman's voice said softly, right next to her ear. "Where to?"

"F-Flare?" Lucy groaned, recognizing the former Raven Tail member's voice. "Wh-Why are you…s-still here?" Even in her groggy mind, she knew that Flare Corona was supposed to have departed the area days ago.

"I stayed to watch the finale, and root for your team," the red haired woman explained, hauling an almost limp Lucy with her over the punishing terrain. "I heard…" here she paused in her speech, to lift her companion over a fallen column. "I heard the Eternal Flame's voice, and rushed over here. Now I am repaying my debt to you."

'Eternal Flame?' Lucy remembered Flare mentioning it during their match, but she wasn't sure what her former adversary meant by it. She shook her head, her vision beginning to clear. It didn't really matter right now. "T-the gate. Take me to the gate."

Perplexed by the request, Flare changed their course slightly.

As if sensing her rescuer's confusion, Lucy said, "One of my spirits, Crux, told me I need to destroy it before the moon returns to normal. The out-of-control magic should collapse upon itself and drag those who don't belong in this time back to their own. But if the magic should drain away with the crimson light…" she trailed off, panting.

"Our hopes of forcing the dragons back through fade as well," Flare finished, understanding. "I'm sorry, but we'll need to quicken our pace. Dawn isn't too far off anymore."

Had that much time truly passed since the battle's inception?

That was when Lucy noticed the deep bruises that mottled Flare's once pale skin. Much like Lucy, the woman was covered in scratches – some deeper than others. Blood still seeped out of a couple, and the resulting tang in the air almost made the blonde retch.

A deep sense of guilt settled over Lucy. Her struggle to reach the gate wasn't the only battle being waged. There were the Dragon Slayers, of course. But there were also her precious guildmates and teammates, and all of the other guilds who had chosen to remain behind to protect the City of Flowers. She desperately hoped they were all alive and well, even Twilight Ogre and Sabertooth. A single death would crush her, she knew.

Flare stumbled, and the two women both fell onto the courtyard's flagstones. "How," gasped Flare, "how are we going to destroy the gate?"

"I have no idea," Lucy admitted. "But it won't matter unless we reach it first."

The other woman arose before Lucy, and offered her a hand up. Taking it, the blonde felt stronger than she had before. The magic of friendship, although not officially recognized by the Magic Council, was a powerful thing and it revitalized her fighting spirit.

She clung to Flare's arms tightly as the ground shook, and her newfound friend did the same. Once the tremors had subsided, they looped their arms over each other's shoulders once more. Step by painful step, they approached the Eclipse Gate's controls. Lucy knew they were her best shot at destroying the monstrosity before her born of Zeref's dark arts and Celestial Magic. If she and Yukino could close the gate from there, maybe it could tear it apart, too. It was, in the end, a device of human creation.

If Fairy Tail mages were good at one thing, it was wanton property destruction. It was their single unifying talent and they excelled at it. (And if what Mavis had said was any indication, the guild had been that way since its birth.)

Funny, normally she tried to keep her friends' destructive proclivities to a minimum and yet here she was, banking on her own innate predilection for it.

'Oh, Irony. Thou art truly fond Fairy Tail, aren't you?'

Flare and Lucy had finally made it to the controls. Glancing around, Lucy didn't see Princess Hisui anywhere. Pity. Her knowledge of the machine would have come in handy. But then…

She eyed the contraption critically.

Good thing Chaos doesn't require a handbook.

Releasing Flare, she warned, "You'd better step back for a moment." Once her friend was safely out of the way, she unleased her patented Lucy Kick on a metal panel. It dented and sparked, but otherwise nothing much happened.

"Can I help?" the red head inquired, a gleam in her eye reminiscent of her time in Raven Tail. Her mouth threatened to curl upward in the demented smile she'd first shown Lucy.

Lucy shrugged. "Have at it. The more the merrier!" She slammed her heel against the same panel as before and it caved in. "Be careful not use magic, though. This thing is designed to absorb it." Or it was supposed to. It hadn't absorbed her magic or Yukino's when they'd shut it, now that she thought of it. Maybe it couldn't absorb any more because it was full?

Should they risk using magic against it?

She pursed her lips and concluded, 'It might still be too risky to use magic directly against it. I don't think Flare's fire or my Celestial Spirits would be able to do much damage to the main structure. We could do some major damage to the controls – no, still too risky. With the gate's magic so out of control thanks to the blood moon, there's no telling what would happen if we added more energy into the maelstrom.' Shuddering, she realized that it might even drag them along the timestream with the dragons and Future Rogue if they did that.

The other woman nodded, accepting Lucy's earlier reasoning, and wound her way to the other side of the device to attack it there.

After several minutes of heaping abuse after abuse upon the device, Lucy stopped, panting and exhausted again. Other than a few marks and some hopeful sparks nothing had changed in its appearance or function as far as she could tell. Her companion didn't seem to be having much luck, either if the frustrated sounds Flare was making were anything to go by.

Time just kept ticking, moving forward into the inevitable conclusion. There wasn't enough to go around (which, she realized, was the reason Future Rogue had made the journey to their timeline in the first place). In the distance, she heard the screams of Mother Glare's children as they fell to the mages protecting Crocus. She could only hope that her comrades would hold out for just a little longer – the long night was drawing to a close. One way or another, she knew it would all end soon.

Looking around, Lucy spotted one of the many broken flagstones that littered the courtyard. This one wasn't too far away, and one of the smaller chunks might be liftable. Making her way towards it, she stumbled (yet again) on the uneven surface. At least this time she managed to regain her balance before toppling over, although it was small consolation.

She reached for a decent sized piece of the rock, struggling to heft the thing. It weighed far more than she'd anticipated. She shouldn't have this much trouble with such a simple task as lifting a stone, she knew. It only drove home the fact that she was pretty much superfluous in this battle. She wasn't a Dragon Slayer, so she couldn't take on the dragons. She wasn't like Erza, or Gray, able to fend off multitudes of monsters to protect the path of retreat for the citizens. Even Happy was out there providing winged support somewhere.

The only thing she'd been able to do was watch as another version of herself sacrificed her life to stop a madman's plan from becoming reality. Along with Yukino, she'd succeeding in closing the Eclipse Gate but that was all she'd amounted to. She couldn't even find Yukino, to see if the other Celestial Mage was still alive or not.

She couldn't even destroy the stupid gate because she was unable to lift a stupid rock!

Dropping the object, she looked for a smaller one. Despite her failings and abundant weaknesses, she was still a mage of Fairy Tail, damn it! And the members of Fairy Tail never gave up! So she ignored the whisperings in the back of her mind; the doubts and fears she felt were allowed to wash over her though she would not allow them to drag her down to the bottom to drown.

She was Fairy Tail.

It was enough.

Her prize in hand, it suddenly became easier to haul back to the controls. Flare paused in what she was doing to observe Lucy's progress towards her. Stepping back, the flame haired woman indicated where she thought Lucy should strike with her new weapon. "Right here, Blondie! There are lots of little pieces."

Lucy possessed but a basic grasp of mechanics (her expertise lay more with astronomy, to be honest). However, she agreed with Flare's assessment. Little fiddly bits and pieces were usually more delicate than the rest of a machine's parts, and more vital to its operation.

Flare reached for the stone, and she helped Lucy lift it as high as they could reach. Then, with all of their remaining strength, they smashed it down upon the machinery. With their combined muscles and the aid of gravity, they were rewarded with sparks flying every which direction. The contraption shuddered violently, prompting Flare and Lucy to beat a hasty retreat to a safe distance as the whole thing groaned.

A high pitched whine settled into the air – keening notes just on the side of human hearing. Undulating across the city, the unearthly, dissonant wail composed a song of desolation and despair. It grated on Lucy's nerves and made her entire body tingle unpleasantly. Something deep inside her soul quailed at the noise.

But that was nothing compared to what the sound was doing to the Dragon Slayers and dragons.

Future Rogue and Natsu's fight had, while Lucy wasn't paying attention, drifted much closer to the raised platform she stood near. With the onslaught of the sound, the two had dropped to their knees, covering their ears with their hands and howling in unison with pain.

Above, dragons roared and screeched in agony. To Lucy's horror, Atlas Flame and Mother Glare plummeted out of the scarlet sky.

She screamed and clung to Flare as the world shook upon the dragons' impact. Stone flew through the air, pelting the two women with sharp, stinging shards. Eyes screwed shut, they hunched down together in a protective ball.

Eventually the earth settled, the pulsing shockwaves from the crash ceasing at last. Despite the end of the quake, Flare couldn't stop shaking against Lucy. In her terror, she was reduced to a whimpering mess. Tears streamed from the corners of her eyes, cutting tracks through the grime that coated her face.

She gasped when she felt the water wiped away. Opening her rust colored orbs, she saw Lucy smiling tremulously at her. "It's okay, Flare. We'll get through this together, I promise."

Although it was shaky, the smile gave Flare strength. "I believe you," she whispered. Taking Lucy's hands in her own, they rose to their feet.

The shockwaves had finished what Lucy and Flare had started. Long, thin waves of electricity flowed around the control device, whipping out towards the girls and snapping back with a hiss. Whatever had been done to it had stopped the keening tone it had been emitting prior to it, however.

Lucy quickly looked towards the Eclipse gate for a sign that this nightmare was coming to an end. However, the monolith remained unfazed.

Her face and heart fell at the sight. Was there nothing they could do to destroy it?

The blonde growled, startling her partner. "Is there anything that can bring down this monstrosity?! At this point, I think a dragon would have to fall on the damn thing to do any damage!"

She paused.

Now there was a thought.

Releasing her friend, Lucy spun around trying to locate one dragon in particular. "Atlas Flame!" she called, cupping her hands around her mouth to carry the sound. "Atlas! We need your…"

She trailed off at the scene that greeted her.

Atlas Flame and Mother Glare were no longer fighting each other. In fact, the two dragons were sitting amicably side by side, heads following – in unison – movement at their claws.

Lucy blinked. "Is the Dragon Tamer spell broken?" she wondered. "But how?"

Peering into the distance, she found her gaze drawn to the frantic movement that had captivated the dragons' attention. A figure was running around frantically amongst the debris, but she couldn't make out much more than that.

Then the figure adjusted their trajectory, and approached the Fairy Tail and Raven Tail mages at breakneck speed.

"OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHH! I'M FIRED UP NOW!" it screamed in triumph.

The blonde spotted the familiar pink, spiky hair of her best friend. "What is he… oh no. Oh Mavis, you have got to be kidding me," she groaned.

Natsu ran towards them at high speed, spouting flames from his maw every step of the way. "How do you like that, Rogue?! This is why you don't mess with Fairy Tail!" In front of him, he propelled what appeared, by Lucy's reckoning, to be a wheelbarrow.

Although the blonde was curious about where and when he had suddenly acquired the object in question, she was far more interested in finding out how he'd managed to get Future Rogue in it.

Indeed, the villain was leaning over the side of the vehicle. He was trying, in vain, to hold back his loose hair as he vomited over the side. The fact that the wheelbarrow jostled the Dragon Slayer every which way whenever Natsu ran over even the smallest pebble was only making his obvious motion sickness worse.

A sweatdrop ran down Lucy's head. "This brings new meaning to the concept of humiliating the defeated."

Her observations were interrupted by a casual, "Yo! Blondie! Red!" The greeting originated somewhere behind her, so Lucy turned to see who it was. Her stomach churned at the finding.

A platinum blonde Dragon Slayer limped into view, supported by his dark haired friend. His leg looked to be broken, and he was holding his side to stem the blood from a wound there. Despite his injuries, he grinned cheekily at the women. "Hey, hey, pretty ladies! Why the long faces? The great Sting Eucliffe has arrived!"

Before Lucy could so much as glare at him, the present era's Rogue dropped the Dragon Slayer of Light right on his smirking face. "Oops. Sorry, Sting," he apologized without any inflection in his voice and without an expression upon his face. Nor did he make any move to help his friend back up.

Sting held his nose as he craned his head up at the Shadow Dragon Slayer. "You did that on purpose, you bastard!"

To which Rogue shrugged noncommittally and replied, "You're durable."

A howl of rage erupted from Sting's mouth.

And this outburst Rogue simply ignored.

Lucy froze at the sight of the Shadow Dragon Slayer and the sound of his level voice. Her face drained of color and her knees locked. She squelched a small cry of terror at Rogue's appearance. In her mind's eye, she supplanted the dark individual in front of her for the maniacally laughing future version of himself. The look of triumph on his face, and the blood that stained the air and her hands as her future self lay dying before her on the cold, blue marble tiles.

"Hey, Blondie… are you okay?"

Sting's concerned voice broke the spell she was under, and Lucy blinked back the vision of her own death. The blonde Dragon Slayer had pulled himself into a sitting position, his fractured leg stretched out before him. His blue eyes regarded her with a mixture of curiosity and true concern – something she'd never have believed possible from a member of Sabertooth.

Rogue, too, she noticed was gazing at her with his one visible, crimson eye – something vaguely resembling worry shining in it.

She blinked again and mentally shook herself as the present and future Rogues tried to swap places once more. 'What happened,' she wondered, 'to make them change this much? Before, they wouldn't have cared a whit about a Fairy's wellbeing.'

"Blondie?" Flare timidly touched Lucy's shoulder.

Lucy tried her best to swallow her fear. She laughed nervously. "What is with you two calling me Blondie, huh? I do have a name, you know." Valiantly, and drawing upon reserves she didn't know she had, she tried to diffuse the awkwardness and joke, "Unless you've both forgotten it, that is."

The resulting looks upon the two's faces, and the copious amounts of sweat sliding down them, were priceless.

"It's… not… Blondie?" Sting offered tentatively, and thereby sealed his fate.

Rogue turned away, shaking his head slightly at his partner's sheer inability to recognize when he was in grave danger.

A dark, tangible aura appeared around Lucy. "You seriously forgot my damn name?!" Sting and Flare 'eeped' and flinched in tandem. "You!" Lucy pointed at Sting, whose survival instincts had finally kicked in, causing him to start panicking. "At least learn the names of the other competitors! Or at least the main team members of your rival! I mean, really?! There were only five of us! It's not that difficult!"

"And you!" she rounded on Flare. The terrified woman's eyes were as large as saucers. "Flare! We actually fought each other! Sting-san's memory lapse can be blamed on stupidity –"

"Hey!" he protested.

"Actually, he just has a short attention span," Rogue interjected in his friend's defense, much to Sting's dismay.

"Hey!" the Dragon Slayer repeated, indignant. Sting stared at his partner. "I'm starting to think that you're not actually on my side."

Rogue returned Sting's look with a flat expression and did not comment further.

"You didn't deny it," Sting observed.

Rogue turned back to Lucy and Flare.

"Don't ignore me!"

Lucy ignored both of them. "But seriously! You have no excuse. How could you forget!"

"I'm sorry!" Flare squeaked, cowering before the raging blonde.

"I do know your name!" Sting interjected, trying to save himself further wrath and what remained of his pride.

The blonde woman leveled a dangerously flat look at him. "Oh?" She raised an eyebrow. "What is it then?"

About to fling a crack about her not knowing her own name, Sting thought better of it as he saw the muscles in her leg contract in preparation for a kick. By the angle of where he sat to where she stood, he judged that the blow would most likely be to his jaw. On principle, he liked to avoid being kicked in the face by angry blondes. On the plus side, he would probably get an eyeful of her panties but then again he also liked the way his nose was shaped. Also, it was just as likely she'd stomp on his broken leg, or on a particular soft part of himself that he was rather fond of. And he knew that he would proceed to cry like a little girl if it came to either of those. "U-um…" he stuttered, mind trying to formulate a new response to the question on short notice. "…Luffy?"

Her eyes narrowed.

"Ah, wait, that's not it! I was joking!" Sting waved his hands in front of his face defensively. "Er, your name is Luigi! No …um …Loopy! That's it. Yeah." Of course that had to be it; it perfectly suited a big-boobed blonde like her.

"Wrong answer, pretty boy." She cracked her knuckles and channeled her inner Lucy Ashley. "I'm going to enjoy rearranging your smug little face."

At Sting's expression of horror, Rogue's self control broke and he snorted outright at his partner's blundering.

The Light Dragon Slayer could only stare in shock at Rogue. He'd never seen the man laugh in front of anyone other than him and Frosch before now. It was strange to see.

However, the Shadow Dragon Slayer's apparent good humor was lost on the irate blonde woman who seemed to have it in for them. "Oh?" she growled, turning her fury on him. "Do you find something funny about this situation?" It was strange, but the anger had overcome her previous fear and unease around the man. His casual amusement may have had something to do with it, though, she realized. This wasn't an expression she'd encountered on Future Rogue. "Unless you can give me an accurate answer," she threatened, "you're in the same boat as your buddy here."

The crimson-eyed man regarded her blankly. Although he was not smiling, Lucy swore that she saw a sparkle of mischievousness in his gaze. "Of course I know your name," he answered. "Lucy Heartfilia-san, correct?"

She blinked. Nervousness and slight fear returned as the anger faded. "Err, uh, yeah. That's my name," she said lamely.

"I always remember," he continued, an unreadable look in his eye, "the names of the strong."

Before she even had a chance to process what he'd said, he pointed behind her. "What is Natsu-san doing?"

Glad for an excuse to avert her gaze, Lucy glanced over as Natsu screamed and ran by with the wheelbarrow. She sweatdropped again at the sight.

"Victory laps, I think."

Rogue fixed his own gaze on the back of the blonde's head while her attention was on her teammate. He knew that he'd smelled fear on her when he'd first approached with Sting in tow. 'No, that wasn't fear', he thought. Simple fear didn't cover the depth and breadth of the emotion rolling off of her in waves. She'd been terrified out of her mind. Still was. He didn't recall having any interaction with her before this point, and he was positive her feelings hadn't been directed at his blonde partner because her visceral reaction didn't occur until she'd spotted Rogue. If he had never met her before, why was she so scared of him? He hadn't done anything against her and her teammates that exceeded Sting's actions – in fact, Sting had gone a lot further than the Shadow Dragon Slayer had. Especially during and after the Naval Battle, where the woman standing before him had been tortured by Minerva.

It confused him.

Then he realized that it wasn't what he had done, it was what he would do. Or rather, his counterpart from the future. He wondered what it could possibly be, to inspire such strong terror at his mere presence. The blonde hadn't been afraid of Minerva. She'd held her head high, and launched a scathing, defiant verbal assault against the sadistic mage. There had been pain, but no fear in her posture or words. Just what had Future Rogue done to her, that it should trump Minerva's cruelty?

But then he thought that he didn't really want to know. That man wasn't him. He would never become someone like that. If he had to, Rogue would spend the rest of his life proving it to the world. And, by extension, to this woman who couldn't even meet his gaze.

He decided that he didn't want anyone who wasn't his enemy to fear him ever again.

"Is that…?" Sting interrupted Rogue's reverie with a question. The blonde man's eyes were trained on his former idol's antics. Specifically, he was watching the violently ill passenger.

"Yeah," Lucy replied, an eyebrow twitching at the spectacle before them.

Rogue shook himself and returned to watching the Fire Dragon Slayer cart his future self around in the wheelbarrow.

"Urp," Sting groaned. "Poor bastard. I feel sick just watching."

"Not to sound skeptical about your abilities," Lucy remarked, "but what happened to the dragons you were fighting?"

Sting rolled his shoulders. "About that… we're not entirely sure where they went."

Lucy stared at him in dawning horror. "…Say what?"

"All of a sudden, they stopped attacking us and lunged at each other. Then they shouted something about how they would finally end their lifelong rivalry today."

'Oh great,' Lucy thought. 'Dragons with Natsu and Gray's dysfunctional relationship.' A horrifying thought occurred to her. "Wait. So… um… so you guys just – I don't know – left them to rampage?!" she asked. 'Just imagining what Natsu and Gray would be capable of destroying if they were the size of dragons is…' Her arms prickled as her imagination took over and provided her with several images she would never be able to forget. In such a world, she would never see her rent money again.

"I wasn't going to get in the middle of that," Sting stated bluntly. "Be a crazy person to get in between two dragons fighting to the death. Could barely put a scratch on one of them. Better for everyone to just stay out of their way." As he spoke, his words faded into an almost incoherent mumble.

"Oddly pragmatic for you," Rogue observed dryly.

"Hey!"

"Natsu would've joined in on the dragons' fight," Lucy mumbled to herself. "Probably yelling something like, 'Don't ignore me! I wanna have a fun fight, too!'" She sighed. It was just one more destructive Fairy Tail battle she would have to prevent. "Thereby proving the point."

Sting, who heard every word, shot Rogue a smug look.

The Shadow Dragon Slayer rolled his eyes.

"Speaking of Natsu, what does that Flame Brain think he's doing now?!" Lucy growled, borrowing one of Gray's favorite insults for the Fire Dragon Slayer. The boy appeared to be trying to make the wheelbarrow fly, using the debris scattered about for makeshift ramps.

The new day's first ray of sunlight pierced Lucy's eyes. Turning her head to the sky, she saw the moon nearly set, the crimson light fading with each passing second. It was too late to destroy the gate now, and yet she didn't feel upset about it at all. It was no longer necessary to do so, after all. Future Rogue was effectively defeated, his magic broken by motion sickness of all things. Four of the dragons had ceased their combat with the humans entirely. There was no longer a need to drag them back to their time; they could now force them through with other means (though she was mostly counting on Atlas Flame's cooperation).

Speaking of which, Natsu needed to stop goofing off and assist the other Dragon Slayers with the remaining three dragons. She glanced behind her. Sting was mostly out of commission thanks to his leg, but Rogue still seemed able to fight.

"Natsu!" she yelled at the over exuberant Dragon Slayer. "Quit running around like a chicken with its head cut off and help your nakama with their fights!"

When she looked back at this moment in the future, she would realize that she should've predicted what happened next. Really, it was inevitable.

The pyromaniac immediately released the wheelbarrow at the blonde's command. "Aye!" he yelled and sprinted in the direction of Atlas Flame and Mother Glare. He knew better than to argue when his best friend put on her scary face and used her Erza voice.

What no one could have predicted was that Natsu's hasty fling of the wheelbarrow would propel his best friend into not one future, but seven.

It would be the start of a journey with an unlikely companion. New allies awaited her, heartbreak and triumph alike strewn along her path.

It would become the greatest, most perilous, heart wrenching, joyous adventure of Lucy's already rather eventful life.

It would also be the most terrifying.

But above and beyond all else…

It was going to make her feel real weird about herself.

I Could Be Your Curse Or Your Angel

-3LAU feat. Bright Lights "How You Love Me"

Let me know what you guys think! I am looking for a Beta for this story, if anyone is interested.